The Washington Post has published a new report detailing Washington Football Team owner Dan Snyder's alleged efforts to interfere with Beth Wilkinson's investigation into his organization's workplace culture.
The Post's latest foray into years of sexual harassment allegations made by former employees describes one alleged effort, by Snyder's lawyers, to secure "silence" from a former accuser by dissuading the woman from cooperating with Wilkinson.
The full report from The Post, which is highly worth your time, shows the seemingly painstaking lengths taken to limit the damages from Wilkinson's nearly year-long investigation and the NFL's apparent reticence to be forthcoming about her results.
It also recounts one particular petty moment which appears to show Snyder taking offense to former team president Bruce Allen, whom he'd fired weeks earlier, for failing to congratulate him on successfully hiring Ron Rivera as Washington's next head coach.
According to The Post, following Rivera's introductory press conference as the new head coach in Jan. 2020, Snyder learned that Allen had sent a congratulatory text to Rivera. "Snyder was insulted, these people said, that he didn’t receive a similar text from Allen, whom Snyder had fired a few weeks before," The Post describes.
Later in 2020, the team, citing the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic, "attempted to get out of paying Allen all of the money he was owed under his contract." Allen fought back, The Post goes on to explain, and Snyder agreed to pay Allen's full salary.
But in a message sent to Allen's lawyers over settlement terms, The Post continues, one of Snyder's lawyers included a condition that Allen wouldn't agree to meet, according to text messages reviewed by The Post.
"In addition, I understand that Mr. Allen has agreed to send a text message to Mr. Snyder stating, 'Congrats on the hire,'" Snyder's attorney wrote in July 2020, seven months after Snyder hired Rivera. Per The Post, Allen's lawyers resolved the pay dispute, but he never sent this text, according to a person with knowledge of the case.
Three months prior, in an ongoing effort by Snyder to unmask leakers, The Post explained, Snyder's lawyers asked a federal judge in Arizona to compel Allen to turn over text messages, emails and other records they believed would reveal Allen as a source behind multiple media reports about Snyder.
In one particular court filing by Snyder in his case against Allen, The Post says Snyder's lawyers attached redacted emails between Allen and others, including then-ESPN analyst Jon Gruden, who at the time of the filing was head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders.
The Post goes on: "The emails, Snyder's lawyers said, were meant to show how often Allen communicated with the media. But not long after, unredacted versions of the emails ended up in the hands of reporters."
By October, contents of those emails had surfaced in a series of reports by The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, leading to Gruden's resignation from the Raiders.
Read the full report in The Washington Post.
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